"Let this much be said: Israel has never devised - not in Dimona, not in underground RAFAEL plants - a weapon against the Palestinian national movement that is anywhere near as effective as the Palestinian's own suicide bomber.

Let the comments fly in, from bottomlessly self-congratulatory supporters of Palestinian statehood in Australia, New Zealand, Berkeley, from all those places where white people like yourselves exterminated indigenous populations with impunity. And stole the land on which your condo was built.

I support a Palestinian state no less than you. But if you spin your impassioned defenses of suicide bombing as a necessary tactic - a natural tactic - a natural response, you'll be spinning that line, and waiting for an independent Palestine, for much longer than any Palestinian should ever have to wait."

I will add only this. When Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum praises the suicide bombing and calls this legitmate resistance against "occupation" he is lying if you think he means occupation only of lands captured by Israel in 1967. The Hamas Charter makes it very clear that its resistance is against the State of Israel and the Jewish people.

WARNING: The talkback section contains the product of enough ranting to fill an asylum and I'm talking about extremists on both sides. It's worth visiting only in order to obtain an insight into perhaps why peace in this region is so difficult to achieve.

Sunday, January 28, 2007

Over the past six or so years since the Palestinians launched the so-called "second intifada" there have been numerous claims from the Israeli side that terrorists were using mosques, hospitals and even schools as bases for attacks on Israelis.

"Before dawn Saturday, Hamas gunmen fired mortars at the Abbas-allied Preventive Security Service headquarters and at the home of the force's chief, Rashid Abu Shbak, officials said.

In fighting around the compound on Friday, six Hamas gunmen were killed and a seventh died Saturday of wounds sustained in that battle, said Hamas spokesman Ayman Taha.

He accused Fatah loyalists of storming a mosque near the security headquarters and executing a senior Hamas activist inside while he was reading the Quran, the Muslim holy book. On Saturday, blood stains were still visible on the mosque's carpet and the bathroom tiles.

Fatah denied it had stormed the mosque, but said Hamas gunmen had used the mosque as a base for attacking the security headquarters."

Saturday, January 27, 2007

One of the bloodiest days of fighting between rival Palestinian terror factions Hamas and Fatah has culminated in fourteen deaths in the West Bank and Gaza as fighting reached new heights in deadly gunfire.

A two year old boy was killed when caught in the crossfire. With no Israelis in the immediate vicinity to blame for the death, Hamas and Fatah officials "accused each other of firing the deadly shot" [read here].

Indeed, despite the loss of life by at least one innocent Palestinian civilian, the absence of any Israelis anywhere near the scene of the fighting appears to have diminished the newsworthiness of the whole story to the outside world.

Thursday, January 25, 2007

The Jerusalem Post's Khaled Abu Toameh reports from Bethlehem that a "number of Christian families have finally decided to break their silence and talk openly about what they describe as Muslim persecution of the Christian minority in this city."

Despite the headline "Bethlehem Christians claim persecution", Abu Toameh's story is unlikely to make it into Australian newspapers like the Melbourne Age. Could it be that the wrong people are doing the persecuting?

And on the subject of persecution that's going on unnoticed, it seems that Irak's Palestinian population is suffering badly at the hands of the thugs in Muqtada al Sadr's mainly Shiite Mahdi Militia. Since the Coalition of the Willing's invasion in 2003 hundreds of Palestinians have been killed in Irak and yesterday Palestinian sources reported that 27 Palestinian refugees were kidnapped in several areas of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad on Tuesday morning.

It seems they some folks in Baghdad don't like the mainly Sunni Palestinians. They suspect some of them of being involved with other foreign insurgents who have bombed Shiite population centres and buildings including mosques and resent them because of alleged favourable treatment received under Saddam Hussein.

Although the cause of the Palestinians in Irak has been taken up by human rights organisations, their story doesn't rate in the western media which tends to focus more on the fact that the whole of Irak has become a quagmire for George W. Bush and his dwindling band of allies.

"HAMAS accepts the existence of the state of Israel but will not officially recognise it until the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, according to the exiled Hamas leader in Damascus, Khaled Meshaal.

"In an interview, Mr. Meshaal softened his anti-Israel rhetoric, suggesting that Hamas does not seek the destruction of Israel as written in its charter. He said that Israel is a 'reality' and 'there will remain a state called Israel — this is a matter of fact". He added: 'The problem is not that there is an entity called Israel. The problem is that the Palestinian state is non-existent'."

Was this a breakthrough in Hamas thinking or was it part of a Hamas PR campaign aimed at softening the international funding embargo that will be lifted only when the Hamas-led Palestinian government renounces violence and recognises Israel and all previous agreements made between the Jewish State and the Palestine Authority?

Well, it didn't take long for Hamas to reveal its true position. A Hamas government spokesperson Ghazi Hamad told Ha'aretz that what Meshaal really meant was, "Israel exists - and that's a fact" but "there was no change in our stance that Hamas does not recognize Israel."

Salah Bardawil, head of Hamas's parliamentary faction, said he checked Meshaal and it seems that his words were twisted and distorted.

"He didn't speak about any recognition of Israel, only a cease-fire with Israel," Bardawil said.

As for that controversial part of Hamas Charter 7 that calls for the killing of Jews ... well, nobody from Hamas or its apologists around the world wants to go there at all.

The fact remains that Hamas is still bent on making Israel disappear and thankfully, no amount of fancy work with smoke, mirrors or the help of the Guardian, Reuters and the Melbourne Age for that matter will help it achieve this aim.

POSTSCRIPT: THE MAHMOUD ABBAS ILLUSION

When you compare Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas with the folks at Hamas, lately he has come across as a veritable peacenik.

The Americans and the Europeans have been running around telling us about his peaceful intentions and only recently Abbas scored lots of weapons to arm his boys and help them keep the peace among the warring factions in Gaza and the West Bank.

Now the peaceloving Abbas is calling on Palestinians to refrain from internal fighting and to direct their guns only against Israeli 'occupation' (read here).

This is a double Palestinian illusion. The first is the one that deals with Abbas the peacenik and the second is about the 'occupation'.

In a former life Abbas was the Palestinian Prime Minister who signed on to the Road Map to Peace without any reservations in June 2003. A month or so later he was ready to repudiate that agreement by saying he wasn't in a strong enough position to disarm terrorist groups.

These days the trick is hard to perform when you advocate that your armed groups should use their arms against Israelis.

Hamas and Fatah may have been getting some guidance recently from Australian Grand Mufti Sheik Taj Aldin Alhilali. The Sheik been visiting the Egyptians and is advising them of the magical ways in which he promotes the cause of peace and co-existence in Australia. Some people believe him as much as they do Meshaal, Abbas and co.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

The Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs Daily Alert of 8 January 2007 contains this aticle from the Hebrew version of Maariv (5 jan 06) by Ben-Dror Yamini

"What Did the Palestinians Do with Their 'Marshall Plan'?

The Palestinians have bought themselves a place of honor on the list of unfortunates in the world. A well-oiled public relations campaign has turned them into a nation of victims. Misery pays. One of the countries hated by the Palestinians the most, the United States, has since 1993 helped them more than any other nation in the world, according to World Bank figures.

From 1994 to 2004, the U.S. provided the Palestinians with $1.3 billion, the EU $1.1 billion, and Japan $530 million. In addition to direct aid, the U.S. is also the largest contributor to UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

In 1992, the Palestinian per capita GDP was $2,683 per person. If there had not been terror, the Palestinian economy could have grown during the 1990s into one of the leaders in the Middle East. The money was used for three major purposes: perpetuation of the refugees as victims, purchase of weapons and explosives, and corruption. Opportunities to achieve independence and prosperity were rejected for the ultimate goal: the removal of Israel from the map.

In relation to their numbers, the Palestinians have received more aid than provided by the Marshall Plan after World War II. Since the Oslo agreements, the Palestinians in the territories have received $5.5 billion, or $1,300 per person. By comparison, in the Marshall plan, each European enjoyed only $273 (in today's numbers). Above all, the guilt lies with those who gave these huge sums without having the Palestinians undergo a period of recovery from their futile dreams of the destruction of Israel. The result is, primarily, the continued destruction of Palestinian society."

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Well, that statement is probably not accurate but I'm taking the lead from the man himself by giving my short review of his recent book what might well be a totally misleading title.

One of America's most inept Presidents (and there have been a few), Jimmy Carter, has written a new book for which he (or one of his advisers) decided to bestow the title "Palestine Peace Not Apartheid".

I got the impression that he was making an attempt in the book to discuss Israeli policies and the Israeli security barrier but with Carter you can never be sure.

Although, the title might suggest to some that Israel (or perhaps Palestine?) is an apartheid state, he makes it clear deep into this rambling and error filled rant that "the driving purpose for the forced separation of the two peoples is unlike that in South Africa -- not racism, but the acquisition of land."

This, of itself, is already a concession that Israel is not an apartheid state and that book title is therefore as misleading as most of the arguments which Carter presents.

And that's before the fact that Israel's security barrier was established not to grab land but to stop Palestinian suicide bombers from killing Israelis (irrespective of whether those Israelis be Jewish, Arab or anyone else who happens to be around).

And that's before the fact that 20% of Israel's population is Arab and has equal rights to representation in Israel's Knesset, in its courts and social service systems

And that's before the fact that the covenants and the charters of the various armed Palestinian groups arrayed against Israel clearly state that their aims are to destroy the Jewish state and to kill Jews and before the fact that these groups have demanded that Gaza and the West Bank are made "Judenrein".

In short, Jimmy's book is garbage.

Even if he isn't a liar or a racist or a bastard, he certainly is a coward who won't debate his ideas with eminent American jurist Alan Dershowitz (read here).

"When Larry King referred to my review several times to challenge Carter, Carter first said I hadn't read the book and then blustered, 'You know, I think it's a waste of my time and yours to quote professor Dershowitz. He's so obviously biased, Larry, and it's not worth my time to waste it on commenting on him.' (He never did answer King's questions.)"

Like many apologists for the Israel bashing cause, Carter would prefer to discuss and debate his views only with those who he considers not to be biased i.e. those with whose views he agrees.

In this manner, the truth must be left for those who read the blank pages.

Jawher, has for the time being escaped the fate of Bangla Deshi Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury, editor of the Weekly Blitz newspaper, who was arrested last year on sedition charges for his alleged association with Israel and his criticism of the spread of Islamist militancy in Bangladesh. The maximum penalty for this offence is death or 30 year’s imprisonment. Choudhury is still awaiting trial (read here).

Unfortunately, even in this sports mad country, we won't be reading much in our newspapers about either Jawher, or Choudhury. Apparently, their stories pale into insignificance next to the obsession the media has for the injustices that have been heaped upon Saddam Hussein and David Hicks.

Friday, January 05, 2007

Ghada Karmi, a research fellow at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter, writes for the Guardian and is an occasional interviewee on BBC World News where she generally blathers on endlessly about the evils of the Israelis or the Americans.

In her latest Guardian article, which was reprinted in the Melbourne Age as Humiliation at the end of a rope, she claims to be shocked at Saddam Hussein's execution and asks "what was the executioner's hurry?"

To her mind, part of the reason was to stop Saddam "revealing secrets about the West's past enthusiasm in supporting and arming his regime. Hence he was tried on the relatively minor charge of killing 148 people in the village of Dujail..."

Could anybody possibly believe that such tripe can emanate from a so-called academic?

The claim that the West supported and armed Saddam while he was waging his war on Iran, which incidentally claimed hundreds of thousands of lives on both sides, is not new and is definitely not a secret. It has been repeated often and it it isn't accurate and wouldn't worry or embarrass America or Britain one iota. The fact is that while Saddam gained a small measure of support from the U.S.A, he was principally armed at the time by the Russians and the French and we know that they had nothing to do with America's war in Irak - in fact they did their level best to prevent it.

And Ghada might believe by her standards that the killing of 148 Kurds was small peanuts but she should tell that to the relatives of those who Saddam and his henchmen murdered, gassed, bombed, tortured, maimed and otherwise harmed during his reign as the Iraki dictator.

Of course, such matters are always peanuts for the pathological advocates of the cause of Palestinian terror in the British media.

For them, the victims of suicide bombings and Quassam rocket attacks are also relatively minor matters to be conveniently airbrushed out of any discussion on the situation in this part of the world.

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

According to Ban Ki-Moon, the new secretary-general of the United Nations, the Israeli-Palestinian issue is at the core of solving all the problems in the Middle East (read here).

It's comforting to know that Sunni insurgents in Irak will stop blowing up Shi'ites and vice versa just as soon as the Israelis and the Palestinians can kiss and make friends.

Likewise, Arab women will be free from honour killings, the Sudanese government and the militias it supports will put an end to their genocidal killing in Darfur and Hizbullah will stop blowing up anyone who disagrees with it in Lebanon.

In the mid '70's ASIO identified Palestinian terrorists planning to kill the then ACTU leader Hawke, the Israeli ambassador and prominent Jewish figures including Isi Leibler and Sam Lipski.

ASIO also said there was "evidence that Palestinian terrorists had a continuing operational interest in Australia and a small number of individuals in the local Palestinian-Arab community might be prepared to provide auxiliary support for a terrorist attack."

Anyone who might have witnessed recent anti-Israel demonstrations, with their attendant anti-Jewish hatred and Nazi symbolism, would be left in no doubt that the threat has not subsided over the past thirty years.